I'll try to not be pessimistic and answer OP's questions, and maybe provide some experiences being a TACAMO NFO.
It seems like there’s a general consensus that it’s a really boring job? Very repetitive and a lot of it is more crew management and politics
Yes, when you are in the air, you are watching a Matrix-style crawl of data feeds. If you are a trainee, you are studying to get qualified. If you're qualified, you are working on the mission report, working on messages, or otherwise killing time. It very quickly devolves into groundhog day.
The crew management/politics part is more closely tied to being a mission commander, and all of problems/experiences that brings.
E.G.: if my qualified seat operator gets injured on the road, how can I cover down/replace them/be legal to fly, etc.
if it is boring do you still enjoy the community and job?
I did not personally, there are a few who do, but they primarily have a leaf on their shoulders. VT-4 is a great place for exposure into the watered-down mission profiles that big wing NFOs fly. For the E-6 sims, it is comprised of navigating, aerial refueling, and reading simulated EAMs; none of which is done by an NFO on the E-6B today. You can't train for what the NFOs do in a non-secure environment, but just because it is classified, doesn't make it cool.
And when you deploy to the coasts, do you actually get to do stuff or are you locked on base the whole time until it’s time to fly.
The famous Navy answer: It depends.
Back in the day, the leash was much longer. Your happiness revolves around jet health, and the planes aren't getting any younger.
There are exercises that can take you to new places, but 99% of that time, that new place is CONUS. I would fully expect to be in the Alert Facility when you aren't flying. You mentioned the coasts, but many days will be spent equidistant from both shores in the Midwest.
in all honesty I don’t enjoy aviation as much as I thought I would and a job where it’s more procedural and management oriented actually sounds nice, at least right now. However compared to the adventures I hear in VP land, maybe not as exciting.
It is procedural, but you are training for a mission that has never been executed, and hopefully never will. The VP bubbas probably have diversity in their mission sets, for VQ(T) it is the same one in perpetuity.
